Oh, By the Way: Dump TSA, Too.

Schneier is a well-known and respected security guru.

...The authors argue that the whole war-on-terror nonsense is useless -- that's not new -- but that the security establishment knows it doesn't work and abandoned many of the draconian security measures years ago, long before Obama became president. All that's left of the war on terror is political, as lawmakers fund unwanted projects in an effort to be tough on crime.

I wish it were true, but I don't buy it. The war on terror is an enormous cash cow, and law enforcement is spending the money as fast as it can get it. It's also a great stalking horse for increases in police powers, and I see no signs of agencies like the FBI or the TSA not grabbing all the power they can.

Terror-mongering works.  Just ask Obama, whose entire '12 campaign will be terrorizing Americans with horror stories about (R) governance.

Part of the success (for the terror-mongers) is the fact that there is no SQC--no metrics--on means, methods, and results.

Yet, in the ten years that Congress has been debating issues like coercive interrogation, ethnic profiling, and military tribunals, the House and Senate Intelligence committees, which have all the proper security clearances to evaluate such questions, have never established any formal process to consistently evaluate and improve the effectiveness of U.S. counterterrorism measures.

Establishing proper oversight and evaluation of the efficacy of our security practices will not come easily, for the security craft guards its claims to privileged knowledge jealously. But as long as the practice of security remains hidden behind a veil of classified documents and accepted wisdoms handed down from generation to generation of security agents, our national security apparatus will never become fully modern.--quoting The Atlantic

Think there's an (R) politician who has the courage?

I didn't think so, either.